


Brutal Honesty

by nomercles



Category: Supernatural
Genre: 1x10 "Asylum", Asexual Character, Coerced Coming Out, Dissociation, Episode Related, Gen, Past Dean Winchester/Sam Winchester, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-05-22
Updated: 2017-05-22
Packaged: 2018-11-03 15:24:01
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 1
Words: 7,356
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10970043
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/nomercles/pseuds/nomercles
Summary: Dr. Ellicott’s “rage therapy” has a few side-effects.  The Winchesters are men of action, but they know words will do just as much damage.  This time they’re going to say all the things they’re thinking, whether they want to or not.  (Set during 1.10, “Asylum”)





	Brutal Honesty

******Link to art:** [ **emmatheslayer's art** ](http://emmatheslayer.livejournal.com/433535.html)  

 

"This brother you're road-tripping with, how do you feel about him?"

 

Damn it, Sam knew this was a bad idea.  This was Dean's plan, he should have done it.  The last thing Sam wanted to do was talk to some guy about how he felt about his brother.  Especially a therapist.  It's too complicated.  Doctors tend to get upset when you talk about how you used to bone, and still want to bone, and why aren't we boning?

 

Sam had actually tried it once.  They were in Spencer, Iowa, and it was three days before the end of the year.  He and Dean had had some kind of argument, something about the car, like always, and the school counselor had joked that they were ignoring each other in the hallways like scorned lovers.  Sam had blushed, and just his luck, it was actually a good school counselor.  She hustled him into her office and started asking him all these questions, about how it wasn't his fault if his brother was "taking advantage", and did their dad know, and do we need to get you out of your home because you're not safe?

 

It was all Sam could do not to laugh in her face.  Dean, take advantage?  If anyone, it was Sam.  He'd started wanting Dean when he was 10, and the wanting never stopped.  And finally, one day when Dean had brought home a girl named Letitia, he decided he wasn't going to listen at the door anymore.  He wanted to take Letitia's place.  So he chased her off, and he pushed out every other girl Dean tried to hook up with.  It took him a couple years, but eventually Dean gave in.  He never told Dean, but Dean had to have known.  He only liked to pretend to be stupid.

 

He sputtered out something about how it was just a crush and Dean didn't know and wouldn't know, and he got out of there as fast as she'd let him leave.  Then he got home and Dad was telling them to pack up, there was something a couple states over, so it didn't matter much.

 

The thing is, Sam really, really wanted to talk to someone.  He wanted some advice on how to handle this.  He and Dean were barely talking, they were strangers now.  A couple of years apart and some stilted conversation before your girlfriend dies doesn't make for a good basis of communication.  He felt like he was 10 again, and he couldn't touch.  Dean didn't seem to want to have anything to do with him, and Sam wasn't going to push it.  What if he had pushed Dean into something he didn't really want?  He'd taken a psych class that talked about incest, and man, they were a textbook case.  Isolation, moving around so much, a childhood lived outside the normal bounds of society.  Sam knew what this guy was going to tell him if he said anything.

 

He had to keep his mind on the con.  Can't talk about Dean really.  Get the info on the riot, get the hell out of there.  It was the only way.

 

So why the hell did he hear himself say _that_.

 

"Uh, I don't actually want to talk about Dean.  Anything else you want to know?  Still good with the quid pro quo, just not Dean."

 

_Damn it, Sam._  He heard Dean's voice, teaching him how to play poker.  Smooth move, giving it all away like that.  The thought of Dean being here in this office with him was awful.  Dean would have blustered on in, pissed the doc off, and been shoved out the door without any information.  But at least the doctor wouldn't be looking at him like he was at Sam right now.  Like he was some interesting specimen.  It'd been a long time since Sam had danced with a psychiatrist; it was the only excuse for making such a stupid mistake.

 

The doc sat back and stared at him thoughtfully.  The silence got a little chilly as it lengthened, and Sam kept his shoulders relaxed and his hands loose, even though he felt flop sweat by the gun tucked in his waistband.  The doctor was the first to look away.  "Okay, Sam.  We don't have to talk about Dean.  How about something else.  Anything good happen recently?"

 

"Does seeing Carhenge for the third time count?"

 

"Third time?  Wow, how did that happen?"

 

Sam stalled out again.  That was another complicated thing.  Can't talk about growing up in the car, either, because then he'll want to know why.  And it was another subject he really, really wanted to talk about.  Maybe he should find a therapist somewhere.  Online, maybe.  Write a book.  Talk to squirrels.

 

"Oh, you know, Dean's a car guy.  And I saw it a couple times as a kid."

 

Another silence.  Sam could see Dr. Ellicott revising his strategy as he went.  Things were different when you were an adult.  This guy was treating him like a challenge, instead of that sickening, helpless, patronizing shit when they thought he was in trouble as a kid.  That had been one of the reasons he tried to stay quiet growing up.  They might still have thought something was wrong, but unless he drew attention, they forgot him soon enough.  He couldn't answer a question wrong if they didn't have a reason to ask it.

 

"Can we talk about the road trip itself?  How long has it been going?"

 

Sam huffed out a laugh.  "Seems like my whole life.  We moved around a lot.  Stanford's actually the longest I've ever stayed in one place."

 

"Your parents traveled a lot?"

 

"It was just my dad, but yeah.  He was a traveling OR tech."  It wasn't true, but it was one of things that Sam had found made too-curious people back off.  If you said something like roadie, they got even more interested, but no one liked to think about surgery.  

 

Sure enough, it still worked.  "What are you studying at Stanford?"

 

"Pre-law."

 

"Do you like it?

 

Sam thought about the hours of classes, the ridiculous essay topics, the guy in the library who always flirted and the way he never fit into the study carrels.  He thought about how lonely that first couple of months had been, and how Professor North's TA had hated him.

 

"You know, it's all right.  It's hard, but I like the challenge," he answered mildly.

 

He couldn't think about Stanford without thinking about Jess.  He met her in the student union when he stood up too fast and she dumped her smoothie on him, making him buy her another.  His throat grew tight again.  He missed her so much.  She'd known about him and Dean, and she'd been concerned at first, but she hadn't judged.  Then she'd met him, and Sam knew she'd understood.  It's not like anyone could ever really resist Dean.  Jess would have tried, but even in that five minutes they were in the same room, Sam knew Dean would have gotten her in the end.  It hadn't escaped his notice that he'd ended up with a girl just like his brother, right down to the birthday.  Dean and Jess would have figured it out too, if they'd spent any longer together.  Dean used to say that girls were like potato chips, and Jess said the same about guys.  They'd have both had fun together, and maybe with Sam, the three of them could have settled down.  He used to think about that sometimes, what it would be like to wake up between them.  But instead, Dad went missing, Dean came, Jess died, and Sam ended up here.

 

Abruptly, Sam had had enough.  He needed to get out of here, or he was going to say too much.

 

"So, doc.  Tell me about the asylum.  Please."  He tossed out the eyes that worked on all his professors, tried to project earnestness and determination to cover the hasty avoidance and the crack in his voice.  He really, really didn't want to be here anymore.

 

Ellicott clicked his little pen and put the pad to the side, half-smiling.  "You didn't come here with trauma, like you said over the phone, did you?  You made an appointment just to hear about the supposed ghosts."

 

Sam blinked, taken aback.  Well, okay then.  "I take it you get that a lot?"

 

The doc reached into his desk and pulled out a bulging folder.  "More than I like, yes.  Here's what I'll do.  I will give you ten minutes with this."  He waved the folder, an arc of blue.  "It's all the notes I've compiled from everyone who's ever come in pretending to actually need to see a psychiatrist for real."  Ellicott narrowed his eyes at him, all business-like affability vanished.  "And then you will get the hell out of my office, so I can go treat people who actually need my help."

 

Sam felt chagrined for a minute, but he wasn't going to turn down the offer.  "Deal."

 

Ellicott swept out of the office, leaving the door open behind him, and Sam started digging.  It didn't take him long to find what he needed, certainly not the 10 minutes he'd been granted.  The details were disturbing.  Deliberate insulin overdoses, castrations, a patient strapped down for so long his skin started to grow over the bindings.  The doc was a brave man, keeping the family name, staying in the same business, in the same town, when his grandfather had been so horrific.  He glanced up at the clock and saw there were 5 minutes remaining, and he came to a quick decision.

 

Moving quickly, he grabbed a piece of paper and Ellicott's pen and started scribbling.

 

\---

 

In exactly 10 minutes, Dr. Ellicott came back into his office, fully expecting to have to roust the jackass sitting on his couch.  They never paid attention to the time, and this one was worse than most.  But when he came in, the office was empty.  The folder was back on his desk, and a piece of paper was on top, next to the pen his dad gave him when he opened his practice.  Looks like the kid left his notes behind.

 

But as he came closer, he saw his name scrawled on it, and he was curious and unfolded it.

 

_Dr. Ellicott,_

_I don't really want to talk to anyone.  I probably need to.  There's just too much to deal with.  My girlfriend is dead.  She died on the ceiling like my mother.  Probably killed by the same demon.  Oh, yeah, forgot to say, that's why my brother came to get me.  My family hunts monsters, and my dad's missing and we're trying to find him.  I took a break to find some answers, and this was just another stop along the way._

_My brother and I used to have a more than fraternal relationship, but we don't anymore.  I wish we still did._

_I don't think you can really help with any of that.  I'm sorry I wasted your time.  Good luck on your patients.  Here's hoping that by this time tomorrow, you'll be able to tell future tourists that it's all just a ghost story._

_\--Sam Winchester_

 

His face went white.  He knew about hunters.  This wasn't the first time they'd come to see him.  All the others were dead.  Hunters were angry, violent people.  Perfect subjects for his grandfather's experiments.  He knew exactly what was going on down there at the asylum--he'd been begging the city to tear it down for years.  At one point he'd hired someone to burn it to the ground, thinking if people can't get in, they can't die inside.  But the guy had died himself.  And now the city was talking about turning it into low-income apartments.  More people with a harder life than they should have, more opportunities for soaking in pain and grief and sadness, more people who were going to get turned.  It would be a massacre.  He had saved almost enough money to buy the place outright.  He'd always done his best to convince people to stay out until then.  It didn't always do any good, of course, but he'd swayed some of them, he knew he had.  He'd started calling the police before someone went in, which helped.  

 

About half the people who'd come to see him over the years had disappeared, or come out violent and cold and taken someone else out with them.  For hunters, it was all of them.  Every single hunter who went into Roosevelt Asylum, even the ones he found out about later, died.  Only one of them, thank God, had killed other people first.  He had never figured out why it was hunters so specifically.  Maybe they were just less tethered to society, fewer stabilizing relationships, or having so much violence in their lives increased their susceptibility.  Maybe it was the early trauma he'd learned most hunters got started with.  Whatever it was, they were like candy to the spirits down there.

 

Sam Winchester and his brother would be dead by morning.

 

He walked wearily into the front office and stopped with one hand on the wall.  "Marsha?  Can you cancel all my appointments for the rest of the day?  We've had another one."

 

Marsha sighed.  They shared a long look.  Marsha didn't like it any better than he did.  Best office manager he'd ever seen.  He paid her double, and it was worth it, especially for moments like this.  Without a single waver in her calm, smooth voice, "I'll take care of it, sir."

 

Ellicott went back into his office and flopped in his chair, the springs creaking.  He needed a drink.  He needed several drinks.  He hated it when hunters came through.  He abruptly decided that in one month, he'd go in himself to confront his grandfather.  He'd been thinking about it for years.  Something needed to change, someone needed to stop Sanford Ellicott.  Maybe shared blood would win through.  He'd never had the courage, and every day the guilt grew.  There was just something about Sam Winchester that made him want to finish things once and for all.

 

He poured a measure of whiskey for himself and another for Marsha just as she came into his office and sat down, right where Sam had been earlier.  Ellicott shuddered and tried not to think of it as an omen.  They stared at each other for a few moments, and Ellicott handed her the note.  He stared out his window, where he could see the hospital in the distance, and sipped his whiskey as she read.

 

"Wow," she said finally.  "I wasn't expecting that.  Should I file this with the others?"

 

They didn't often leave notes, but a few had over the years.  Everyone needed someone to remember them, even though most of them didn't actually think they were going to die.  The impulse to confess, to brag, to be known, was strong.  One woman came in and took the same offer he’d made to Sam.  Instead of a simple letter, when he reentered his office, there was a thick professional manuscript on his desk.  In the foreword, she'd written that she never had intended it to be published, but someone needed to know who she was and what she'd done.  

 

No one wants to be forgotten.

 

"Yes, please."  He hesitated over telling her this next part, but Marsha was capable and thorough.  She'd make the arrangements better than he could.

 

"I'm going in.  Next month.  Does that give us enough time to close things out here?"

 

A stifled gasp, and then silence.  When she spoke, Marsha's voice was choked, but business-like.  "Yes, sir.  I'll have the files put in storage.  Is your will up to date, or shall I arrange a call with your lawyer?"

 

Good old Marsha.  If she went into politics, she'd have the deficit cleared in two weeks and the military quivering.  "I have the will in my desk here.  What about you?  Will that give you enough time to find another job?"

 

Marsha laughed.  "Don't worry about me, sir.  Greenley's been trying to poach me for years."  There was a quiet clink as she set the glass down, and a rustle of fabric as she shifted her weight.  "Sir, why now?"

 

Ellicott finally looked back over at her.  She was sitting there in her good gray suit and pearls, her hands folded neatly in her lap, looking every inch like she was the doctor rather than him.  He felt a surge of affection for her.  

 

He smiled a bit, and said, "You know, I think I'm tired.  It's been a rough couple of years, what with Susan dying.  I'm just sick of watching people die when I could do something about it."

 

Marsha tsked.  "You don't know that going in there will actually do any good, sir.  And you have been helping.  I'd say you've been helping more than those hunters ever have."

 

He thought about it for a bit.  It was too little, too late, but he'd been carrying around in his head a list of the hunters who had come and gone.  He needed to write it down before he went in, have Marsha do something commemorative with it.  They deserved to be remembered, they all did.  Marsha would think of something tasteful.  In the end, there was really only one thing to say.

 

"Here's to Sam Winchester."

 

\-----

 

First there had been Dad with his fucking asshole coordinates, didn't even have the courage--or concern--to talk to his children.  He knew Dean had called him from Lawrence, asking for help.  Dad never even bothered to pick up the fucking phone.

 

Then there had been these stupid fucking kids, going where they had no place to be.  Gavin trying so hard to impress his girl, and Kat only half interested in being impressed at all.  Now the little pissant was trying to be all brave and commanding.  Definitely better to give Kat the shotgun.  Gavin would blow his dick off trying, and Kat might do it on purpose.  That'd be a relief.  Either way, no more little Gavins running around.

 

And now there was Dean.  Dean, his irritating, obnoxious, slutty older brother.  He got them into this mess in the first place, didn't he?  If he hadn't been so ready to hop to, they wouldn't have to be here.  They could be out looking for Dad.  Maybe Dr. Ellicott was right.  This did feel a lot better.  Dean, on the floor in front of him, begging.

 

He felt a bitter surge of satisfaction go through him, sharp and vicious.  That's where Dean belonged.  Always telling him what to do, treating him like he didn't have a fucking brain.  He went to fucking Stanford, and what did Dean do?  Dean stayed home and followed Dad around.  Sam should be in charge.  Not Dean, not Dad.  Maybe after he brought Dean to heel, he'd go find Dad himself and take care of him, too.  

 

Dean was talking.  Begging.   _This isn't you talking, Sam._  Oh, but it was, and it felt so good to just...let it all out.  Stop trying to be polite and restrained.  Show the world how he really felt.  Show Dean how he really felt.

 

How dare Dean reject him like he did.  Sam laid it all out there for him--go to Stanford, become a lawyer, get a house and a job and maybe a dog, get away from all the bullshit of their family--and he asked Dean to come with him.  Dad came back right in the middle.  Dean just stood there and let them fight it out.  Never took a fucking stand like he should have.  Whatever happened to always protecting his little brother, huh?  Whatever happened to that?  He should have chosen Sam.  Instead he just drove him to the goddamned bus stop, shoved him on a stinking silver bus, and stopped talking to him.  All he left him with was a kiss goodbye.

 

That was some kind of bullshit right there, that's what that was.

 

Dean's talking about how they have to get him back to normal.  Fuck normal.  Normal didn't get him anywhere.  Normal got him a dead girlfriend and an aborted education.  A different kind of normal had him following bullshit coordinates in a text message from a man who wouldn't even pick up the fucking phone.

 

He had an urge to kick Dean, shoot him again with the rock salt, maybe.  That had been fun, watching him bounce through the wall like that.  Maybe tie him down until he saw reason.  Make him apologize for ditching him, and then put him in his place.  He felt his jeans get a little tighter when he thought of all the things they used to do, all the things Dean wouldn't let them do now.  Just another thing to take out of his hide later.  Yeah.  There's Dean on his back, and that is exactly where he should be.

 

He didn't realize he was saying all that out loud, until Dean started to show a different kind of fear.  And then it was just hot.  Dean looked good when he was afraid.

 

Dean was on the filthy floor, begging him to make it fast.   _Real bullets will work a hell of a lot better than rock salt._  Handing him his gun.  

 

His dick got harder.  Maybe this was even better.  Just shoot him.  Get it over with.  Move on with his fucking life.  No more hunting random fucking monsters all over the country; he could spend all his time with revenge.  Dad did it for years; it's the family fucking tradition.  

 

Sam tossed the shotgun carelessly to the side.  If it went off, it was just going to hit Dean again, and well, Dean was going to be dead in a minute, so who the fuck cared.  He braced himself over Dean, gun aimed right at his pretty mouth.   _You hate me that much?_  

 

He felt a flicker of confusion.  Hate Dean?  He didn't hate Dean.  He just wanted him to go away.  Hell, if he hated Dean, he'd just aim for his head with the shotgun.  Rock salt or not, you take a few rounds in the face with that, and you're not coming back.  He loved Dean, that's why he was going to make it quick.   _Think you can kill your own brother?  Go ahead._

 

The fury came back, like some thick, red, soupy wave, and Sam didn't want to be angry; he wouldn't be angry if Dean would just stop talking.  Had to make him stop talking.  The gun would make him stop.  That's the main lesson Dad had given them--you can stop anything with enough bullets, even your brother.  He was gripping the gun so hard his knuckles ached.

 

Dean snapped for him to do it, and the wave crested.  He squeezed, and _click_.

 

He blinked, confused.  Pulled the trigger again, and again.  Firing pin striking against nothing, hollow snap, the dissatisfying aborted jolt in his palms.  Why the hell wasn't it working?  Dean must have done something to it.  His hands loosened as he started to lean down to get the shotgun, go back to shooting him in the face with it, and Dean's hands were harsh on his wrists, jerking his aim off to the side, torquing his shoulders to follow,  He braced himself for the impact on the floor.  Dean's fist broke dull crunching pain against his jaw, and he hit the doorjamb on his way down.

 

Where's the gun?  Where was the gun?  Dean hit him.  Just one more thing to add to his list of grievances.  Oh, there it is, the gun's by Dean's foot.  Sam rocked forward to reach out for it, as Dean's foot swept it further away.  Sam's lip curled as he glared up at his brother, who was staring impassively down at him.  Sam scrabbled on the floor and clutched a jagged piece of wood in his hands, probably from where Dean went through the doorway.  Dean's fist came down again, an inexorable force.  His head cracked against the floor, and all he saw was quickly fading bright white.  Just before he let the black take him, he felt a pat on his ankle, and Dean's whispered, _Sorry, Sammy_.  The rage tried to take him again, but the black was too thick, too strong, and he was pulled under.

 

\-----

 

Dean was going to kill his dad.  Sure, send them on a case in a haunted fucking asylum where the head honcho liked to make really pissed off people homicidal.  That's a great plan.  He probably thought Dean was too dependable to get angry, but that was bullshit.  And now he, Sam, and two idiot kids were going to wind up dead if he couldn't find some goddamned bones of some goddamned quack. _Fuck_ his chest hurt.  He was damned lucky that Sam was still a little rusty.  If they'd taken this on in two weeks, he'd be dead, and those kids would be next.

 

He started moving through the filth.  Ellicott's little workshop of horrors was a connected series of rooms, broken surgical tables and rusty instruments everywhere.  His flashlight carved a temporary channel, quickly gulped back up by the murk.  The smell was impressive, even in their line of work.  Mildew, corroded pipes, that weird tangy scent that was dried up and flaking blood.  If they got out of here, they'd need to re-up their tetanus shots.  He batted aside grimy plastic curtains with the shotgun; knew if he touched them with his bare hands, he wouldn't get that scuzzy feeling off his fingertips for days, no matter how often he washed them.

 

The rancid, sweetish odor of decay was getting stronger the further in he went, but not thickly enough he could track it.  Like rotting meat with a couple of drops of nasty drugstore perfume.  After thirty years, a body shouldn't be making that kind of smell anymore, but it wouldn't be the first time something supernatural made it all go strange.  He shoved aside another curtain, and found the last room.  Nothing.  Fuck.  He'd have to go through it all again, and only hope Sam didn't wake up in time for a rematch.

 

There was a white boxy thing against the far wall.  He swept the light over it more slowly.  Metal cabinet, doors closed...dusty tuft of hair sticking out by the hinge.  Bingo.  He delicately tugged open the door, and there was Ellicott.  And he reeked.  Seriously, he shouldn't be smelling this much anymore.  Pretty much only dogs should be able to get anything off him at this point, and that was debatable.  The salt and lighter fluid mixed greasily with the remains, and he gagged.  It did not matter what he went after, how gross it got, humans still were the worst.  The good doctor had obviously crawled in there to hide during the chaos.  Dean didn't know if he couldn't come out, or just didn't, but Ellicott died all cramped up, pissed off and self-righteous.  Served him fucking right.

 

Just then a table walloped him in the side, and he was flung back a good three or four feet, slamming back down onto his back.  Before he could do more than gasp, Ellicott's spirit was pressing him back down, spidery fingers driving electricity into his brain. That slimy, neck-ruffling, impossible recent death smell was all around him.  He saw blue St. Elmo's fire flickering at the edges of his vision, and he suddenly _got_ it.  

 

Jesus Christ, he was pissed.  Dad was a bastard.  He didn't even have the decency to fucking call him back, just goes missing for weeks at a time.  Doesn't give a shit.  Sam, shooting his own goddamned brother in the chest for the express purpose of making it hurt.  Mom, dying and leaving them all stuck in this fucking mess.  Those fucking morons upstairs, he had to go through all this to rescue them because they didn't have the sense to get laid on the ugly fucking roses on their momma's ugly fucking couch.  No, had to come into this place.  Should just get up and walk out, let everyone go fuck themselves, get revenge on his own.  Show Dad he was a better hunter after all.  Show Sam that he didn't need him.

 

He wasn't angry at Ellicott--he was grateful.  Ellicott was making him face all the shit he shoved down, and for what?  What fucking purpose?  Why not be angry, and make the world pay?  All it did was take, wasn't it about time he got some?  No, Ellicott was right, this was the way to be.  Fucking hurt, though.  Needed to get rid of him, just to make the pain stop.  Not like a goddamned ghost was going to listen when he said he got the message.  Not like he could get the words out anyway.

 

He fumbled for his lighter, just barely out of reach.  His fingers scrabbled against the folds of his duffel and he dragged it closer.  Round wood, shotgun.  Round cardboard, salt canister.  Oily plastic, lighter fluid.  Cold hard corner of something.  Yes.  Lighter.  

 

He flicked it on, singeing the edge of his thumb--just another thing to add to his list of grievances--and tossed it toward the bones.  Soon as they were gone, Ellicott would be gone, and then he could get on with his newfound purpose.  Make the world a better place.  Make them all pay.

 

Dean smelled bone dust and ash.  Ellicott pulled his hands back, taking the burning, jittering, muscle rigidity with him.  He scrambled back and covered his face as he watched Ellicott watching his own body dissolve and collapse.  A blue spark flashed across his vision, leaving spots behind, and with the body, the anger abruptly disappeared.

 

Is that what Sammy felt?  Jesus, no wonder he was acting like that.  Dean had felt nothing but rage.  He didn't care about Sam, he didn't care about Dad.  Didn't care about those kids.  He didn't want to save anybody, he wanted to beat people senseless for needing to be saved in the first place.  Like the real evil was stupidity, not monsters running around killing people.

 

He felt sick.  There was no way he would have had the motor skills to use a lighter with electricity going through his brain if Dad hadn't trained them with a taser.  He thought about it a second.  Yeah, he was still pissed at Dad.  He probably wasn't going to stop being pissed.  But right now, it didn't matter.  All that mattered was getting his brother and the lovebirds back out.  Maybe put the fear of God into them as a parting gift.

 

\-----

 

Dean sat there stiffly, pinned down.  Didn't even want to move to get more whiskey, and fuck, he really wanted a drink right now.  The carpet was this ugly speckled thing that looked like it might have been an even shittier green about 30 years ago.  The flecks of color kept swimming in and out.  He was afraid to look up.  He knew Sam was staring at him.  He was afraid to move at all.  He told Sam he wasn't in a caring and sharing kind of mood, but his brother never could leave well enough alone.  This conversation was not something he wanted to have, but he knew if he tried to walk away, Sam would chase him down and then they'd be having it in the fucking parking lot.

 

"So, uh, yeah.  Ellicott--the dead one, I mean--made me realize some stuff, and uh, I guess I am pissed about some stuff."  Sam was stammering.  He didn't sound like he wanted to be here, either.  Sam's voice when it came next was quieter, more hesitant.  Dean knew if he looked up he'd see Sam looking about as nervous and guilty as a puppy who had pissed on the rug.

 

He didn't look up.  This was Sam's show, and he wasn't helping.  Sam could keep on going without any input from him.

 

"Dean, I..."  Sam's voice trailed off.  He cleared his throat again, a nervous tic.  He couldn't think of the right words.   _Dean, I miss you.  I miss us.  I want to pick up where we left off._  Yeah, that'd go over well.

 

"Do you ever miss us?"  Sam winced internally.  That was...yeah, Dean was going to mock the shit out of him for that one.

 

Dean froze.  Shit.  Had he given something away?  He'd tried so hard to keep it under wraps.  Out of respect.  Out of not wanting to fuck Sam up even more.  Only thing worse than Sam knowing is if everyone else knew, too.

 

The words were tumbling through his head, all these things he wanted to say, but nothing was coming out.  Like his lips were sewn shut with strips of his own tongue.  Broken.  Weak.  Pathetic.  Unnatural.  He could almost hear his own brain wheezing that sad, frustrated scrape of a loose fan belt.

 

A couple started screaming next door.  It took them both a minute to figure out if it was a fight or a fuck.  It'd take more than that to break the tension piling up in the room.

 

Dean jerked when Sam's voice came out.  Not even loud, just too close, and too sudden.  Too there.  Dean did not want to be having this conversation, but Sam was going to make him do It anyway.

 

"Dean?"  Sam sounded worried now.  Any second he was going to reach over and shake his shoulder, or snap his fingers under Dean's nose.

 

His own voice startled him.  He hadn't meant to say anything at all, had been hoping Sam would take a cue and leave it all the fuck alone, but there was something deep inside him that wouldn't let him just ignore his brother when he sounded upset.  Maybe it'd be easier if he left it alone, let it stay buried.  But he just couldn't handle the thought that Sam would think there was something about him.  He knew Sam, he would take in anything he didn't say and make it about how he was a bad person.  For a kid with so much going for him, he seemed to run on guilt.

 

"I figured some things out, too.  When you were out in Cali."  The words got stuck in Dean’s throat again.  How the hell was he supposed to say this part?  

 

"I, uh, I met this chick.  Gina.  I was out in New Orleans, picking up something for Dad, and she was the waitress at a bar.  We hung out awhile."  He smiled to himself.  Gina had been a piece of work.  He almost caught himself spinning the same type of bullshit he usually did--great tits, hair, legs, whatever--but he remembered this was supposed to be a confession.

 

Sam was being uncharacteristically silent.  Kid could outwait the Devil if he thought he was on the right track.  So Dean took a deep breath and kept going.

 

"At first I was trying to get in her pants.  She had hips I could've held onto for days, and she was funny.  Thought it'd be a nice time.  But, uh, she didn't want to.  I was going to let it go--I don’t go where I’m not wanted--but she kept showing up where I was.  I thought she was stalking me.  Or maybe she was a monster or something."

 

Still quiet over on Sam's side of the room.  The people next door had stopped whatever they were doing.  Their TV was blaring, loud enough to fill the space between him and Sam with a commercial for collectible coins.  Dean kept staring at the floor.

 

"Anyway, it turned out Gina didn't much like sex, and I was going to be in town for a while, and her room was right next to mine, so we ended up just...hanging out.  Got to be friends.  I tried to put the moves on her a couple more times.  I think she had to have been a teacher in another life or something, because she'd shut me down with just a look.  After a while, she asked me to come with her to a support meeting.  I don't even know why I said yes."

 

Deep breath.  This is the part Sam wasn't going to believe.  Well, Sam wasn't going to believe any of it, but whatever.  It was true, and if Sam couldn't handle it, Sam could leave.  He was good at that.

 

"Gina was asexual.  Didn't like sex with anyone.  Not from trauma or whatever, just didn't like it.  Thought it was messy."  He heard a muffled snort and stole a glance up.  Sam's eyebrows were folding up into his hair, but he didn't look pissed.  That was a good sign.  

"I went to a couple more meetings, mostly out of curiosity.  This guy, Travis.  He started talking to me.  I told him about you.  About us, I guess."  Sam sucked in a breath and held it.

 

"He said I didn't talk about anyone the way I talk about you.  What the hell kind of a thing to say is that?  You're my brother, the only one I got, of course I'm going to talk about you different.  But he said you were the only one I talked about actually wanting to fuck.  I talked about everyone else like a...a conquest or some shit, but I talked about you like--shit, man, this is cheesy, but he said I talk about you like I was a virgin and you were the first guy I dated."

 

Sam laughed.

 

"I know, right?  Anyway, uh, there's a word.  Demisexual.  That's me.  I guess it means I don't really want sex with someone until after I know them pretty well.  And we don't really make friends, so I never really want to fuck anyone."

 

This time the silence was prickly.  Angry.  Dean kept his eyes on Sam's face.  Here's where Sam would walk away, if he was going to.  And Sam looked pissed, but he wasn't getting up.

 

"Let me get this straight.  You, Dean Winchester, the guy who comes on to every drunk woman he sees, doesn't like sex.  Dean, you use fake ID to get girls to sleep with you.  But you don't want anyone.  Right."  His voice was flat, bitter.  "'It's not you, it's me.'  There's no need to fucking lie to me, man.  You just don't want me."

 

Dean's fingers were cramping from holding himself tightly in place.  In his head, he was doing frenetic sprints around the parking lot, so he could keep his body quiet.  He'd always had a hard time sitting still on a hunt.  Dad had taught him to imagine himself in motion.  It worked.  Usually.  This was harder.  He wasn't trying to make himself be still, he wasn't trying to make himself _stay_.  

 

He wanted to laugh.  If only he were lying.  It would be so much easier if he were lying.

 

His voice creaked out.  "I'm not--"  He stopped to clear his throat, weakly.  Took a breath, coughed again.  This time his voice was stronger.  Strained, but at least he sounded like himself.  "I'm not lying.  Sam, it is me.  I'm fucked up."  His fingers twitched, between his knees.  The words were grating their way out like loose gravel pinging the undercarriage of his car.  

 

"I don't want sex.  It's not bad or anything, it's just really fucking boring, and then there's the clean up, and the awkward disappearing act."  He huffed out a laugh.  "Do you know what I do the most, Sam?  We cuddle.  Most of 'em just want someone to talk to."

 

He dared a glance up.  Sam's mouth was unattractively hanging open, his forehead all wrinkled up, and his eyes squinty.  It was the same face Sam wore when Dean tried to convince him the ice cream truck only played music when it didn't have any more ice cream.  Sammy always was a suspicious little shit.

 

"So you've never wanted me?  You just, what, went along with it to make me happy?"  That suspicion was replaced with growing horror.  "Dean, did I force you?!"  

 

Dean's eyes popped wide, and he leaned back, fingers spread in front of him.  "No.  Sammy, look at me."  He wanted to grab Sam's hand or something, get his attention that way, but he waited until Sam made eye contact on his own.  It took a minute.  "You did not force me to do anything I didn't want to do.  You really think I couldn't have stopped you if I wanted?"

 

Sam didn't look appeased in the slightest.  "You have always said yes to me.  About everything.  The only times you ever said no were when Dad told you to, and then half the time you found a way to sneak it past him anyway."

 

Dean felt something ease a little inside him as he laughed.  No reason why, it's not like this was going to be over any time soon.  "Yeah, well, that's true."  Dean scraped a hand over the back of his neck, trigger-rough fingers digging into the rigid knots there.  He took a deep breath, and let it out slow, before continuing.  He looked up at Sam again, who was watching him intently.  

 

"Sam, if I were telling you yes just because it's what you wanted to hear, do you really think we'd be talking about this now?"  He paused for effect.  "I hate this shit."

 

Sam snorted, and a grin teased the edge of his mouth.  Kid never did have a good enough poker face.  "Yeah, you and your chick flick moments.  You're good at 'em, though."

 

Dean was relieved.  If Sam was joking, that was the end of it for now.  He wasn't stupid enough to think Sam wasn't going to circle back and yank his legs out from under him sometime. He’d start asking awkward questions eventually, but he was dropping it for a while.  He wiped his face clean of expression, and pasted on an affronted look.  "You take that back, you little shit.  Don't be mean."

 

Sam just laughed.

 

\----

 

Two weeks later, Dr. James Ellicott walked into his office and flipped on the lights.  Wednesdays he got here early, getting some of that paperwork done that Marsha was always hammering after him for.  Hanging up his coat in the closet, he took out the Mister Rogers sweater.  He didn't turn the heat on.  Marsha did that.  Until then, he wore a sweater.  He puttered into the tiny kitchen off the bathroom and started coffee.  Jackson Browne started crying through the speakers.  It was early enough he could listen to anything he wanted, but he'd never had the stomach for anything out of the ordinary before breakfast.  Mornings were for easy and normal and pretending you were still asleep.

 

Walking back into his office, he started sorting through his mail.  Bill, letter, bill, bill, magazine, insurance.  Postcard?  He sometimes got letters from past patients, and they were always a break from the monotony.  Mornings were for easy and normal, but nobody liked boring.  Far too often, private practice was boring.  This was a bland postcard with the Sweden House Lodge sticker still on.  Scribbly, uneven letters spidered their way up to the corner of the card.  He absentmindedly thwapped it against his leg as he headed back to the sputtering coffee maker.  It wasn't quite finished yet, but the light was better in here for now.

 

_Dr. Ellicott,_

 

_This is Sam Winchester.  I wanted to let you know that my brother and I have laid your grandfather to rest.  The hospital should still be torn down, but not because of his ghost.  We salted and burned his bones, and nothing's ever come back from that._

 

_And that other thing I told you about.  That's taken care of, too.  My brother's moved on.  I hope I will too, someday._

 

_Thanks,_

_Sam_

 

**Author's Note:**

> This story would not be what it is without the work of Jennifer, Pink, my roommate who helped me troubleshoot "guy talk", and that one dude who taught me how guns feel when they misfire.


End file.
